Liver disease rarely announces itself early. By the time symptoms appear, the damage is often advanced. We asked Professor Patrick Kennedy, Professor of Hepatology, to explain how FibroScan changes that picture, what liver fibrosis actually is, and why liver disease is becoming more common.
FibroScan is a non-invasive test, so it's a simple way to assess liver health. It takes about five to ten minutes and, in many cases, replaces the need for a liver biopsy. It lets us assess liver health using two measures: fibrosis (scarring) and steatosis (liver fat), giving a good overall picture of an individual's liver health.
A blood test is really just a snapshot of the liver at that moment - it tells you if there's evidence of inflammation, but that can fluctuate quite markedly. FibroScan gives a formal assessment of the actual degree of liver damage: the amount of fibrosis and the amount of liver fat. It's far more information than a set of liver enzymes alone.
Because it's a simple, non-invasive test, we can establish the degree of liver damage, if any, often on the same day. That includes the amount of fibrosis, or scarring, and the amount of steatosis, or liver fat, giving a same-day answer about the health of someone's liver.
FibroScan is an optional add-on scan if clinically indicated and is a non-invasive scan of the liver only.
FibroScan is a way of assessing liver health alongside imaging and blood-based liver markers. If it is clinically indicated, it can be added on as an additional scan, sometimes at the same visit or if prebooked.
Fibrosis of the liver is scarring laid down as a result of continuous damage to the liver over time. If the damage continues, the fibrosis will progress - and in some cases, that progression leads to cirrhosis, chronic liver disease, decompensation, and in some cases liver cancer.
One of the difficulties with liver disease is that symptoms often present very late. By the time someone presents with jaundice, ascites from decompensated chronic liver disease, hepatic encephalopathy, or bleeding from oesophageal varices, these are all very late-stage presentations of chronic liver disease. This is where FibroScan offers something genuinely useful: early assessment and early detection, while there's still an opportunity to intervene with appropriate treatment.
People classically associate liver damage with alcohol consumption, but there are many other causes of liver disease, fibrosis and even cirrhosis. One of the most common is what's often referred to as fatty liver disease, now better described as metabolic liver disease, or MASLD/MASH. This is largely driven by lifestyle factors associated with diabetes, obesity and lack of exercise, and it carries a significant burden in terms of ongoing liver disease treatment.
Absolutely. We can assess liver health, usually with FibroScan, to determine the degree of fibrosis or damage. In many cases, if it's caught as early fibrosis, appropriate intervention and treatment can reverse it. More recent data also show reversibility, even in the presence of cirrhosis in some cases. It comes back to early liver disease assessment and detection, and the ability to improve someone's liver health through appropriate management.
The simple answer is that liver disease is increasing. Deaths from almost all other cancers have plateaued or even declined over the same period, which makes this a stark warning that liver disease is on the rise, with liver cancer as a complication of chronic liver disease. This often relates to lifestyle factors, obesity, diabetes, viral liver disease - and, of course, alcohol consumption, particularly excess alcohol consumption. This tracks with Cancer Research UK's own analysis, which found that liver cancer death rates in the UK are now almost twice as high as they were 20 years ago, making it the fastest-rising cause of cancer death in the country.
Because liver disease often develops silently, a same-day FibroScan can flag early changes long before symptoms would ever prompt a visit to a GP. It's a five-to-ten-minute, non-invasive test that can replace the need for a liver biopsy in many cases.
Get in touch with our Lumen Harley Street team to include a FibroScan liver health check as part of your Lumen visit.
Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter! Stay tuned for the latest updates, insights, and exclusive offers delivered straight to your inbox.
One of our health assessment team members will be in touch with you shortly!
